COFFEE BEANS & BEINGS / WILL NEW COFFEE SALES SAVE INDY BOOKSTORE?

Bay Books of Coronado in limbo after 27 years in same location.

Coronado is a small isthmus town across the Bay from San Diego and sandwiched between the Navy’s elite SEAL team training facility and Naval Station North Island, the latter homeport to three state of the art aircraft carriers.  It’s also home to the West Coast’s leading Victorian architecture Hotel Del Coronado.

And, for now it boasts the one and only independent book store between Coronado and the border with Mexico.

If Bay Books of Coronado were a cat it would currently be on its 8^th life as its future has been in doubt since in 2017 developer Bruce Kleege bought the land under the book store and the rest of the Orange Avenue block it sits on.

Kleege’s plans call for a mega block of new retail. 

To date, one by one Bay Books’ neighbors have closed.

Owner Angelica Muller read the tea leaves and figured her longtime book store was doomed.  She stopped ordering new books back in October, which didn’t exactly make for a  cha-ching holiday sales boom.

In fact, Muller told the San Diego Union-Tribune that after 27 years in the same location she was ready to close February 1, but the closure of a nearby T-shirt shop gave her operation a lifeline.

New landlord Kleege suggested Bay Books move into that available space. 

Muller said she’d love to but she needed permission from the Coronado city fathers and mothers to sell coffee and a small menu of food items like pastries in order to make a go of it.

Coronado said it hasn’t received a request from Muller or Kleege to serve coffee but “we are open to considering all proposals to keep Bay Books operational,” said Mayor Richard Bailey.

Stay tuned.

BTW: There is an outdoor coffee wagon outside the store, but they have to share revenues with the kiosk owner.  Having coffee and treats inside the store would give the bookstore the extra revenue it needs.

Book store website: Click Here.

Author of “Make Your Bed: Little Things That Can Change Your Life ...and Maybe the World,” Admiral William H. McRaven stopped by Bay Books and signed a few copies of his book for his new friends. His book became an instant best seller.  If the name is familiar, he was in charge of the Navy Seal bin laden raid in 2011.

View of North Island Naval Air Station (left) and Coronado (center) from the PillartoPost.org hot air blimp before it was shot down.  Luckily it crashed on the beach in front of the Hotel Del Coronado all hands aboard made it to the hotel bar.